Ban on 'gruesome images' threatens free speech

2:09 PM,
Jun. 18, 2013

Written by

Charles C. Haynes
Gannett

For those of us who worry about the vitality of free speech in the "land of the free," the news this week isn't good.

On June 10, the U.S. Supreme Court refused to review a Colorado appeals court decision banning anti-abortion activists from displaying "gruesome images" of mutilated fetuses that might be seen by children.

The case that precipitated the appeals court ruling, Scott v. St. John's Church in the Wilderness, concerns an anti-abortion protest that took place several years ago on a public sidewalk near a Denver church - a church the protesters believed had fallen away from the ...